"For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ."-EPH. iv. 12.

THE first truth which may be pointed out as implied in the figure, 'the body of Christ," is the very close union between Jesus Christ, and those who are really His. It is a union similar to that of spirit and body. The Church of Christ is the body of Christ, and the Church consists of those, and of those only, who are thus one with Him.

We do not realize this sufficiently. Very many of those who swell the numbers of the visible Church are only on terms of ceremony with Jesus Christ. Is it otherwise with us? We are

not necessarily of the body of Christ by having been baptised, or brought up in a Christian family, or having taken a ceremonial part in the communion. We may have eaten and drunk in His presence, yet not be recognised as His. "If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of His." The Christ of the true Church is not a system of doctrine which may be learned by the intellect, nor a mystical or material person into which the bread and wine of a sacrament may be changed, and so received into our bodies. He is a pervading and animating Spirit; and that Spirit can pervade the whole Church only in one way-by animating the soul and body of each member of the Church.

How then may we attain this? By yielding ourselves to the Spirit of Christ. That is a very expressive phrase. It implies,

first of all, not so much the zealous doing of something, as the letting ourselves be put right. It is more passive than active. It means the opening of our hearts to Christ. We cannot open our hearts by a resolution. We must yield them to the influence of such love as commends itself. We must let Him come in, because we have seen Him to be worthy. He stands at the door and knocks; at the common door, by which all loved ones come in, and He knocks just in their way. But when He comes in, it is not to have one of many seats at our table, but to be the new motive and spirit in us; to animate us as members of His own body. Jesus Christ must thus be in us, and to that end we must yield ourselves spiritually to Him. As a flowerbud yields itself to the rays of the sun, so will our hearts open to the felt love of Christ.

But we must yield ourselves to Him, in the other and harder sense of bringing our wills into subjection to His. What a stubborn and perverse thing our will is! It is like an old servant, who has long had his own way, but who has got a new master. He recognises his master's right to rule, but it is so hard to obey all at once. Self-will, long indulged, becomes stiff; it cannot bend easily to another's will.

In the unconverted soul, the will is in league with the appetite and desires and passions. The rightful ruler of them all, the spirit, has been so neglected, that if it speaks at all, it is in a weak way, without tone of authority. But when the Spirit of God quickens that spirit in us, straightway it rises in the consciousness of new strength and begins to take its rightful place, and to assert its true authority. Then the battle begins between the old servants who had been masters, and the new master over them. Then one can understand why the Spirit of God has laid so much stress on our overcoming; why so many promises have been given "to him that overcometh." We need daily grace for the conflict, else we should come under the dominion again of our own worse selves, and cease to be of the body of Christ.

You will see thus the true reason why, as believers in Christ, we should lead holy, loving lives; not merely because we have made a paction with Him, but because we are of Him; because His Spirit is in us, and we are again temples dedicated to the Lord. We ought to feel ourselves one with Him; identified with Him, in life as in interest. The union between the soul and the spirit of Christ is vital, a union of blended personality

as soul pervades the body, and as spirit quickens the spirit in us.

The thought which is next suggested is the unity of the Church in itself. Probably there never has been an age when it was more difficult to recognise this unity of the body of Christ. One's first and natural idea of unity is that of external uniformity and external union; the opposites of these strike one more in these days. We have not only diversity, but separation, and in some cases not emulation merely, but enmity. Enmity between Christians is inexcusable-is almost a contradiction in terms; and it may well be doubted whether much of our separation into sects, while it has been overruled for much good, has not had in it the sin of schism. Whenever people fall out, and secede in anger, or jealousy, or uncharitableness, and are more ready to rejoice than sorrow over each other's failures or misfortunes, we may rest assured that the guilt of schism lies on them.

Still with much outward diversity, there may be real and conscious unity. There are diversities of tastes and diversities of operation, but the same spirit; and the great end may be best served by variety in the forms and by classification of the opinions in the Church, so that each may do his part in the way that suits him best, provided that the one thing needful is kept prominent.

This accordingly suggests the question-In what does this unity consist? In the unity of the faith.

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One faith," it may be necessary to say, does not mean, oneness of opinion in all things pertaining to our faith, or oneness in our ways of defining the faith; but unity in the faith itself. Regarded in this way, there is, when one thinks of it, far more real religious nnity, even among those who seem to differ much, than they themselves quite realise. Taking faith as the reverent, filial, penitent trust of the soul in the living God and in Jesus Christ our Saviour, there is a large prevalent unity. But when people begin to define that which they cannot comprehend, and to magnify matters of opinion, they begin to differ, and quarrel, and separate, and hate one another. Given a number of men thoroughly in earnest, and with a fair knowledge of the facts and truths of the gospel, trying honestly to be true to their light, and bearing with one another in matters on which they do not see alike,—I am quite sure that, however men may judge, God sees their unity, and recognises them all as of the body of Christ.

Further; when we think of the figure by which St. Paul describes this unity, we discover some very important practical bearings of it. Two of the most obvious of these are the necessity of mutual forbearance and mutual helpfulness.

Every union implies a measure of restraint; each limits the freedom of the other. To be bound in a bundle when the separate members are free agents, is to feel restrained by the bond. Two horses or two oxen yoked together are not free to do as each pleases,; they must wait on each other, and learn to pull together. So, in all our associations, and not least in the Church,―we have to learn the duty of considering and bearing with one another. You do not solve the problem by keeping apart from your neighbour as much as possible. You must draw near to him, speak to him, and act towards him as a brother, as a member with yourself of the living spiritual body of Christ; and when you and he cannot agree about some point of doctrine, or as to the best way of doing this or that, you must learn to forbear, by seeking some common ground, and cultivating the spirit of unity.

There is also the necessity of mutual helpfulness. The right purpose of a member of the body is not to seek its own good, but the good of the body of which it forms a part; and so the right attitude of a member of the Church, the body of Christ, is to seek not his own, but the things which are Jesus Christ's. Our true life thus is found in losing it. We find our truest good in crucifying self in faith and love.

We cannot be absolutely independent. It is a necessity of our nature that we should help one another, and the Spirit of Jesus Christ only makes the sense of this stronger. The very idea of the Church is that of an association, with a common faith and service, and bound by a spirit of mutual helpfulness. "The eye cannot say to the hands, I have no need of thee; neither the head to the feet, I have no need of you; nay much more, those members of the body which seem to be more feeble are necessary;" so in the Church, no one can say to his neighbour, I am entirely separate from, and independent of you; and as mutual dependence is a natural fact, so mutual helping is a Christian duty. If we are indeed one with Christ, we shall also be one in Him. Each will rejoice in another's success, and be ready to contribute to it. There should be no schism in the body. "Whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or if one member be honoured, all the members rejoice with it."

There is certainly a great deal of this in the Church, and in the world through the influence of the Church. Not self-interest, but love, is the cement that binds the atoms of life into Christian unity. We readily forget whence some of our most noble and precious things have come. How few realise that all the charitable institutions of these times, all the sympathetic responses which famine and disaster, anywhere in the world, meet with from those more favoured, are due to the teaching and influence of Him who lived His simple life in Nazareth, and ministered in the towns and villages of Galilee and Judea! Christianity has told to a most blessed degree on the life and custom of the world; yet how much remains for it to do!

We are not true to Christ, else there would be far more mutual helpfulness. Not in trouble only, but in all circumstances, should we try to be as helpful as possible, that, "bearing one another's burdens, we may so fulfil the law of Christ."

The text suggests next, the diversity of service, as of gifts, in the Church. St Paul enlarges on this in the 12th chapter of 1st Corinthians, and also in the 12th chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, "As we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office; so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another."

"The body," he says, "is not one member, but many," and then he shows the fitness of this, because of the many functions to be discharged. If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing? if the whole were hearing, where were the smelling?" The manifold usefulness of the body consists in its having many members, with diverse functions, able to work simultaneously. Such is the very condition of the Church's

usefulness.

The apostolic rule is, "As every man hath received the gift, even so, minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God." Let no man say, then, that he is not gifted. Every one is gifted. God has endowed all, though not all alike; but as He has not given to one the gifts of his neighbour, so He does not hold him responsible for them. If He has given you money, or a higher rank than some, put it to a Christian use. If your station be humble, you can there do service impossible to the rich. If you have a gift of teaching, use it; but if not, then do something else; for you may be sure that there is something which you are able, and expected to do.